CHAPTER 13
Dead Men Own Banks
The photograph stayed on my father’s phone while everybody in the van stared at it.
Tasha.
Detective Lawson.
Uncle Kendrick.
Three people who had no business standing in the same room.
Especially Kendrick.
The last time I heard his name, my mother swore she watched Lawson put a bullet in him.
Now he was standing inside the abandoned First Carter Bank wearing a charcoal suit, smiling like death had been nothing more than a business trip.
“You lied again,” I said.
My mother didn’t look away from the screen.
“I told you what I believed happened.”
“You said you watched Lawson kill him.”
“I watched Lawson shoot him.”
“That sounds like the same damn thing.”
“It isn’t.”
I laughed, but nothing about the situation was funny.
“What happened after he got shot?”
“Kendrick fell. There was blood everywhere. Lawson’s men dragged me out before I could check his body.”
“So you never saw him dead?”
“No.”
“Did you see a funeral?”
“No.”
“A body?”
“No.”
“A casket?”
“No.”
Each answer made my anger rise.
Apparently, nobody in my family knew how to die properly.
My mother had died and come back.
My uncle had died and come back.
At this point, I wouldn’t have been surprised if my grandmother walked through the van carrying groceries.
Nesha shifted on the stretcher and groaned.
The doctor pushed her shoulder down gently.
“You need to remain still.”
“I’ve been shot, not buried,” Nesha mumbled. “Stop treating me like I’m dead.”
“You almost were.”
“But I’m not.”
Her voice was weak, but the attitude in it sounded familiar enough to settle something inside me.
I moved closer and took her hand.
“You scared the hell out of me.”
“You owe me a new shirt.”
“I’ll buy you the whole store.”
“You already own one.”
“For now.”
The smile left her face.
“They’re going to take it, aren’t they?”
“If Lawson has his way.”
My beauty supply store was the only legal thing I had ever built.
I had stood behind that counter ten hours a day when I was pregnant with Amaya. I had ordered inventory from my hospital bed after having her. I had learned taxes, payroll, vendor contracts, and every other piece of paperwork nobody taught girls like me growing up.
Now I knew my mother had used it to wash Carter money.
Lawson had used it to watch me.
Dre had used it to set me up.
And somewhere along the way, my dream had become evidence.
My father enlarged the photograph.
“The image was taken eleven minutes ago,” he said. “The tracker is still moving inside the building.”
“Then we’re going.”
The doctor looked up sharply.
“Nesha isn’t going anywhere except a surgical facility.”
“I wasn’t talking about Nesha.”
“You donated blood less than an hour ago,” he reminded me. “You’re exhausted, dehydrated, and running on adrenaline.”
“I’ll sleep when my sister is safe.”
“Tasha took the key,” Dymond said through the speaker mounted near the driver.
She was following behind us in another vehicle. My children were somewhere else with people she claimed she trusted.
I didn’t trust anybody she trusted.
But Jayce had spoken to me on the phone.
He and Amaya were alive.
For the moment, that had to be enough.
“She didn’t take it,” Nesha whispered.
Everybody looked at her.
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“She didn’t know it was in the deposit bag.”
“You said you gave it to her.”
“I did. But I never told her what it was.”
My father frowned.
“Then how did she end up at the bank?”
Nesha closed her eyes as if speaking required more strength than she had left.
“Somebody called her.”
“Tasha told me she was alone,” I said.
“She was. At first.”
“What aren’t you telling me?”
Nesha opened her eyes.
“When I gave her the bag, she asked why it was so heavy. I told her it had store receipts and cash inside. She said she would put it in her safe.”
“And?”
“After Key left, Tasha’s phone rang. She went into the kitchen, but I could hear her arguing.”
“With who?”
“I don’t know.”
“What did she say?”
Nesha swallowed.
“She said, ‘You promised Keyshia would never find out.’”
My stomach tightened.
“Find out what?”
“I couldn’t hear the rest. When she came back, she was crying.”
Tasha didn’t cry.
Not in front of people.
Not when our mother supposedly died.
Not when her marriage ended.
Not when she lost a baby at seven months and spent three days in the hospital refusing to let anybody see her break.
If Tasha had cried in front of Nesha, whoever called her had ripped open something deep.
“Did she say anything else?”
“She asked me if I believed people could be forgiven for something they did when they were scared.”
“And what did you tell her?”
“I told her it depended on what they did.”
My mother lowered her head.
I saw it.
A tiny movement, but enough.
“You know,” I said.
She remained silent.
I stepped closer.
“What did Tasha do?”
“Keyshia—”
“What did my sister do?”
My father moved between us.
“This isn’t the time.”
“Move.”
“Listen to me. If Kendrick is alive, every second we waste—”
“I have spent my whole life being the last person to learn the truth about my own family. Nobody is changing the subject this time.”
I looked around the van.
My mother.
My father.
Nesha.
Dymond listening through the speaker.
A family made from secrets, betrayal, and blood.
“Somebody better start talking.”
My mother finally raised her eyes.
“When you were twelve, Tasha helped me disappear.”
The air left my lungs.
“What?”
“She was thirteen. Old enough to understand that I was in danger, but too young to understand what helping me would do to you.”
A memory came back to me.
Tasha standing beside me at our mother’s funeral in a black dress, holding my hand so tightly my fingers went numb.
She hadn’t cried.
I thought she was trying to be strong for me.
But she hadn’t been grieving.
She had known our mother wasn’t in that casket.
“She knew you were alive?”
“She knew I survived the accident.”
I stared at the woman who had spent twenty years pretending to be dead.
“You made a thirteen-year-old lie to me?”
“I didn’t have a choice.”
“There’s always a choice!”
“If you had known, they would’ve gotten it out of you.”
“I was twelve!”
“Exactly.”
Her voice cracked.
For the first time, my mother didn’t sound like the woman who created an empire.
She sounded like somebody who had destroyed her children while trying to save them.
“Tasha met me at the hospital before Kendrick moved me,” she continued. “I made her promise to protect you and never tell you what she saw.”
“What did she see?”
My mother looked toward the photograph.
“Kendrick.”
A cold feeling crept across my skin.
“He helped you disappear?”
“He arranged the closed casket. He paid the coroner. He changed the records.”
“Then why did Lawson shoot him?”
“Because Kendrick tried to sell me.”
My father’s jaw tightened.
“That wasn’t the story you told me.”
My mother turned toward him.
“I didn’t know who I could trust.”
“You married me.”
“And you were sleeping with my best friend.”
Nesha slowly raised one hand from the stretcher.
“I would like to officially remove myself from this portion of the family conversation.”
Nobody laughed.
My father looked away.
The silence confirmed enough.
Nesha’s mother.
My father.
Another betrayal buried beneath all the others.
I didn’t have time to unpack it.
“Why would Tasha go anywhere with Kendrick after knowing he tried to sell you?”
“Because he knows her secret.”
“What secret?”
Before my mother could answer, Dymond’s voice came through the speaker.
“We’ve got company.”
The driver checked the side mirror.
“Two black SUVs. No plates.”
My father reached for his gun.
“Circle?”
“Most likely,” Dymond answered.
The doctor swore under his breath.
“This vehicle is carrying medical equipment and an injured patient.”
“They won’t care,” my mother said.
The first SUV slammed into the back corner of our van.
Metal screamed.
The doctor fell against a cabinet. I grabbed the stretcher before it rolled sideways.
Nesha cried out.
“Keep her stable!” I shouted.
My father fired through the rear window.
The glass exploded outward.
The SUV fell back for half a second before speeding toward us again.
Another vehicle pulled beside the van.
A passenger lowered his window.
Gun.
“Down!”
Bullets tore through the side panel.
I threw myself over Nesha while the doctor covered her head. Cabinets burst open, spraying gauze, syringes, and bottles across the floor.
Then Dymond’s car appeared beside us.
Her passenger leaned out and fired.
The attacking SUV swerved, struck a concrete barrier, and flipped onto its side.
The second one stayed behind us.
Persistent.
Close.
My father looked at the driver.
“Take the next exit.”
“The bank is straight ahead.”
“I know. Take the exit.”
“You’re taking Nesha to the clinic,” I said.
My father looked at me.
“And you?”
“I’m going to the bank.”
“You’re not walking into that building alone.”
“I won’t be alone.”
Dymond’s voice came through the speaker.
“That depends on whether Keyshia plans on shooting me when I get out.”
“I haven’t decided yet.”
“Fair enough.”
The van slowed near the exit.
Dymond’s sedan pulled alongside us.
My father grabbed my wrist.
“Kendrick is dangerous.”
“So am I.”
“You don’t understand. He isn’t just an accountant. He designed the structure that kept the empire invisible. Shell companies, foreign accounts, judges, police, politicians—he knows where every body and every dollar is buried.”
“Then he can tell me himself.”
“If he’s working with the Circle, he won’t tell you anything.”
“He’ll talk.”
My father studied my face and must have recognized something in it.
Maybe himself.
Maybe my mother.
Maybe every Carter who had ever chosen violence before patience.
He released my wrist and handed me another magazine.
“You have twelve rounds.”
“I only need one if Uncle Kendrick gives me the wrong answer.”
The van turned toward the exit.
I kissed Nesha’s forehead.
“Stay alive.”
She caught my arm.
“Key.”
“What?”
“Tasha loves you.”
My eyes burned.
“Then she has a strange way of showing it.”
“So do you.”
The rear doors opened while the van was still rolling slowly.
Dymond’s car moved close enough for me to jump inside.